Human Rights violations in Mexico. Is Mexico a failed state?

Event information

Organised by the Business School’s Latin American Studies Research Group as part of the Seminars on Latin America series.

Speaker: Dr Elvira Dominguez-Redondo, Associate Professor of International Law, Middlesex University School of Law on 'The situation of human rights defenders in Mexico'.

Plus a speaker from Mexico on the 43 disappeared students of Ayotzinapa.

This seminar discusses two issues; firstly the enforced disappearance of 43 Mexican students on 26 September 2014. Allegedly committed by municipal police in Iguala, Guerrero, this tragedy made headlines around the world. Secondly, in light of this and a long history of impunity for those who commit human rights atrocities in the country, we ask whether Mexico can be deemed to be a "failed state".

Dr Elvira Domínguez-Redondo is one of the five independent experts forming part of the Civil Observation Mission who visited Mexico, in November 2014, to observe the situation of human rights defenders. During the visit the Mission visited the Raul Isidro Burgos teachers' college in Ayotzinapa, where it interviewed family members of the 43 disappeared students. A final report of the mission will be published in May 2015. You can read more about this visit here.

Dr Domínguez-Redondo specialises in international law and human rights legal theory. She is the author of two books, Public Special Procedures of the UN Commission on Human Rights and Minority Rights in Asia (co-authored with Professor Joshua Castellino). She has written a wide range of articles on human rights topics for academic journals.

Seminars on Latin America offer a rare opportunity to insightful analysis of contemporary issues in Latin America. Dr Dominguez has written extensively on Latin American issues but also on Venezuela, a country she has visited to carry out research and get to know its reality first hand.